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Whether you’re a novice or advanced when it comes to marketing, our workshop on developing a marketing plan can benefit you. From identifying the right target market to establishing your competitive advantage to using the most effective promotional tools, by the end of this workshop you will be able to create the perfect marketing [...]

It’s hard to believe that we’re about to enter the final quarter of 2015. Fall is quickly coming & the holiday season is right around the corner. Have you been tracking the effectiveness of your marketing? If not, there’s no time like the present to start. Join Sunny Day Marketing on Tuesday 9/29/15 from [...]

We’re in the heart of the summer and during that time people tend to be outdoors taking advantage of the great weather and participating in more activities that they enjoy. For your brand, this is a great opportunity that you shouldn’t let pass by. Think about ways you can incorporate summer themes and information in [...]

Whether you’re a novice or advanced when it comes to marketing, our workshop on developing a marketing plan can benefit you. From identifying the right target market to establishing your competitive advantage to using the most effective promotional tools, by the end of this workshop you will be able to create the perfect marketing plan for your brand!

JOIN US on 4/7 to learn how to develop a marketing plan thats effective, affordable, and easily implementable!

Over the course of her career, Nicole McGarrell has worked in a variety of marketing areas ranging from Sales to Promotions to Advertising to Partnerships. This varied background has allowed Nicole to look at marketing from different lens than most other marketers and develop ideas that are well-rounded in scope and provide a truly integrated marketing experience. As well, her optimism and solution-oriented attitude make working with her an experience that is not only motivating but refreshing and effective. Nicole has worked with Food Network, American Express, and a variety of small business owners and non-profits across all industries. In addition, she also delivers workshops and speaks on panels about Marketing and Branding nationwide.

It’s hard to believe that we’re about to enter the final quarter of 2015. Fall is quickly coming & the holiday season is right around the corner. Have you been tracking the effectiveness of your marketing? If not, there’s no time like the present to start. Join Sunny Day Marketing on Tuesday 9/29/15 from 9a – 11a at the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce offices to find out how to best evaluate your marketing campaigns.

You’ll learn:

How email open- and click-through reports can help you know:

Which of your products/services are hot, which are not, and how to test for best results

Out of a field of everyone, who is interested in what topics – so you can focus your precious time, efforts & energy

The calls to action/messaging that actually WORK

Best times, days and ways to get the response you want

How evaluating event registration and survey response patterns can help improve your next campaign by leaps and bounds

How social media engagement and click rates can tell you the topics, type of media posts, and frequency your connections really want

We’re in the heart of the summer and during that time people tend to be outdoors taking advantage of the great weather and participating in more activities that they enjoy. For your brand, this is a great opportunity that you shouldn’t let pass by. Think about ways you can incorporate summer themes and information in your branding and promotions that are relevant to your customers.

Here are a few to get you started:

Hold a summer-themed event that will encourage people to visit your establishment

Since people usually like to be outdoors more when the weather is nice, give them another destination to go to. Make sure you find a way to tie in your products or services. For example, if you’re a service provider, you can give out door prizes, and one of the lucky recipients can receive a free consultation from your business.

Distribute branded hot weather promotional items

Just because people like to be outside more doesn’t mean they don’t want to stay cool. This is your opportunity to provide items to them that will keep them cool, but also reinforce your branding. Think about the items people tend to use in the summer: visors, water bottles, coolers, mini-fans, etc. For a minimal cost, you can brand these items with your logo. That way, each time someone pulls it your branded water bottle for example, they will see your brand name, and it will keep it top of mind for them. As well, it will be seen by other prospective customers as well if it is used in public places.

Offer summer time discounts on certain items

It is easy for people to forget a business’ offerings, especially if there haven’t been any major changes in a while. A business can use the summer as an opportunity to promote certain products that are not as popular as others. For example, if you own a bag company and you notice that certain bags aren’t selling, brainstorm how you can showcase how they might be perfect for summer time use and then sell it as a special “summer time” discount.

These are just a couple of ideas on how you leverage the summer to market your offerings more. They’re easy to implement and can be cost effective. Do you have any other suggestions on how to do summer-time marketing well?

In February 2015, the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce chose me to be one of their honorees, along with Assembly Member Annette Robinson; Michael Pugh, President & CEO of Carver Bank; and Maxine Stephenson, Co-Founder of Zeen, Incorporated, for their Black History Month celebration. Not only did the Chamber honor me, I also received an official proclamation from the Office of the Public Advocate of the City of New York.

When it comes to marketing many people are not clear about what exactly it is and encompasses. It is often used interchangeably with the word “advertising”, which is incorrect. Simply put, Marketing encompasses certain type of activities that ultimately make people aware of a product or service to result in a variety of end goals, such as increased sales or brand loyalty. The best way to think about marketing is to think of a pie. In its totality, a pie is typically a large round dessert, but when it’s time for it to be served, it’s cut up into several slices.

Some of marketing’s “slices” include:

Advertising

Social Media

Promotions

Email Marketing

Blogging

Events

Partnerships

Sales

Public Relations

Brand Management

When it comes to your own marketing pie, you may have a couple of slices or several slices, but it is important to cut your marketing pie into the most effective slices.

For example, if you have a bakery, having brand awareness and brand loyalty are probably integral to being successful. Therefore some of the most effective tools may be social media (so you can speak directly to your customers and get feedback), email marketing (so you can share updates and promotions with targeted lists), and strategic partnerships (to ensure you keep growing your potential customer base by leveraging your partner’s network).

So, now it’s time for you to figure out how your marketing pie will be divided. Start by thinking about your audience and who you are trying to reach (your target market). Next think about the best way to reach them (ex. are they active on social media? Are they newspaper readers?, etc.) Then look at your competitors and industry, and see what tactics appear to be the most effective in terms of increasing customers and sales. Once you analyze these three main areas, you will be able to decide what core marketing activities will make up the slices of your marketing pie.

For more tips or if you would like to see how Sunny Day Marketing can help you, contact us here.

New small businesses and entrepreneurs can all use some more capital for their businesses, but outside of loans, crowdfunding, or asking family or friends (usually not the best move), they often are at a lost how best to obtain capital. That’s why this article from Black Enterprise comes right on time with their all-inclusive list of startup competitions.

Looking to create an effective Marketing Plan? Make sure you cover these areas!

Executive Summary: An overview of your entire plan and a quick summary of what is to come in your Marketing Plan. This part is usually done last.

Marketing Strategy: Decide what your marketing goals are and how, when, where, and why you are going to reach them in this section.

Target Customers: This section is where you will clearly identify who your customers will be, demographics, their income, and other general information that can help you understand their needs

Unique Selling Position (USP): What makes you stand out from your competition? Why should potential customers buy from you and not your competitors? Once you identify your USP, make sure to reinforce it all times when promoting your business.

Pricing: Making sure that you are fairly priced within your market, not too low or high so that you are in aligned in the position you want to be. : Give thought to how you can increase your transaction sales. Should you increase prices or try selling bundles?

Distribution Plan: How will you be selling your product or service? Outline if you are online based, a retailer, sell directly and so forth.

Promotions Strategy: In this section you will need to elaborate on how exactly you will promote your products or services to your target customer. By reviewing past successes and failures, you can determine which is useful and which is less effective

Online Marketing Strategy: The world has become extremely digital, so in order to stay ahead of the game you must be sure to advertise where people are looking. Have your website optimized, use keywords and ensure that you have a good social media presence. It is not just social media, it is also reputation management

Marketing Materials: What materials will you use to get the word out about your business or campaign? Be sure to account for business cards, flyers, banners, etc.

Conversion Strategy: What exactly will be your strategy to convert leads into sales? This section is dedicated to talking about how you will need to pitch your business in order to heighten sales

Joint Ventures and Partnerships: By cultivating relationships with other companies you will allow yourself a bigger reach. Elaborate more on how you will team up with establishments to grow your business

Referrals: Referrals are wonderful. By coming up with a strategy to draw in referrals your company can experience constant growth. Establish what incentives you will offer

Retention Strategy: You want to keep the customers you have so by offering discounts, free beneficial information etc. you can keep customers coming back.

Financial Projection: This is more of a ‘goal’ oriented section. Include your expenses, sales and profits so you can analyze and keep on track with your company’s growth

Analytics: Without tracking your results, you will not be able to determine how successful you truly were when it comes to hitting the goals you set in your marketing strategy. Be sure to put benchmarks in place and review your results regularly.

Doing Market Research is usually one of the very first steps that needs to be done when creating business strategies. This helps you set prices; pave the way for all of the services you decide to offer and figure out the best way to provide them, among other things. Research is one of the most critical phases of the process to fully understand your company and meet needs in the market. As there are many different methods to research, it can be quite a varied process. Some companies can invest more time than others, while others can invest more money. These include the deciding factors as to how in-depth it goes. As Market Research comes with tons of very detailed questions as a way to dig into exactly who you are as a company and other related areas, it often leaves many business owners baffled. The good news is that there is a simple way to get to the root of what you are trying to achieve.

A few questions that one may ask when doing a evaluation of their business would be:

What will I be offering?

To whom will I offer it?

What problem am I trying to address?

What price would someone pay to acquire my product or service?

Is my product new or an improvement upon one that already exists?

Where will I promote my product or service?

How will get this information to my prospective clients?

Where are my prospective clients or customers located?

Knowing if you can supply a certain demand is necessary. Here are three ways you can get some good feedback from your target audience:

Surveys

Polls

Focus Groups

After you have decided which route you will like to go, be sure to pay close attention to the analytics. The feedback you receive from your survey, poll or focus group will be your window into what your target market really wants. A few questions you may want to ask to get insight on what others think about your competitors and the industry itself may be:

What do you like most about (add your competitor’s name here)?

How valuable is their product or service to you?

What keeps you loyal to their brand?

As a customer, what else would you like to be offered in terms of services and products?

By asking simple, yet effective questions such as these, you are enabling yourself to gain insight on what others candidly think of the industry and your competitors, ultimately giving you a head start on how to bridge the gap. This information would be your ticket to the top.

Let Sunny Day Marketing help take your business to the heights of success we know you can achieve. Contact us today to schedule your consultation.

For all business owners, the ultimate goal behind creating a marketing strategy is simple: achieving business success. Increasing your bottom line, building brand awareness, generating new leads, or creating an air of trust between existing and prospective clients are amongst the top motivators. Within your marketing strategy, you will want to be very clear in expressing who you are, what you do, what you offer, how qualified you are and of course, why prospects should use your services or buy your products. The reason for coming up with a strategy is to effectively communicate why customers should work or form a relationship with you.

There are many companies that have mastered the art of successfully marketing their businesses. Companies such as Chick-fil-A, with their widely known ‘Cow Campaign’ took the world by storm and after years of being in business and marketing consistently, Chick-fil-A is wildly successful franchise. With dedication, sticking to what you believe in and offering quality service, the sky is the limit. Of course, arriving at your success level of choice is no easy task. It takes a well-thought out plan and dedicated implementation of that plan.

For your strategy to work, it has to be properly executed and configured. In this case, for a business owner looking to climb the golden ladder of greatness, you have to be multi-faceted and consistent. Marketing is a constant job and requires dedication as well as flexibility. It is the very source of how your business thrives so ensuring that the right message is being generated and heard, you must invest in the proper resources. Short cuts are never recommended.

As we stated, in every marketing plan, your strategy should be clearly articulated. Here are a few suggestions as to the direction it should take and what it should contain:

Define your product or service

Determine your goal

Establish who your target market will be

Study your competition and business trends

Figure out what sets you apart from your competition

Be flexible enough to know that change will come with time and be okay with modifying your plan

Determine best platforms to promote your product or service

Create a timeline

These are just some of the main points that every business should include in their marketing strategy in order to be successful. We here at Sunny Day Marketing are always excited in seeing our clients shine. We’d love to see how we could help your business grow- call us today at 347-460-8179 or visit us at http://sunnydaymktg.com.

Compete for a share of $50,000 in small business grants.

Register for the FedEx Small Business Grant Contest, and tell us what separates your business from the rest. You could win:

Grand prize grant of $25,000

Four first-place grants of $5,000

Five second-place grants of $1,000

Entering is simple. Click the contest registration button below and submit your business story and photos by February 9. Once your application is approved and the voting period begins, you can vote for your business once a day – and get your friends, customers, and associates to vote for your business every day. Voting period is January 16 through February 23.

The number of votes you receive will boost your visibility in the contest and is one factor that FedEx will consider when selecting the top 100 finalists and the winners. We will review every submission to identify the most compelling business stories. So tell us your story today, and you could walk away with one of ten grants to invest in your business.